Homelessness in America reaches record level amid rising rents and end of COVID aid
CBSN
Homelessness in America reached a new record earlier this year partly due to a "sharp rise" in the number of people who became homeless for the first time, federal officials said Friday.
More than 650,000 people experienced homelessness on a single night in January, a 12% jump from 2022, the report from the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) found. That's the highest number since the country began using the yearly point-in-time survey in 2007 to count the homeless population.
Thousands of Americans joined the ranks of the unhoused population in the last year due to the end of pandemic programs such as the eviction moratorium as well as jumps in rental costs, the report found. The end of COVID-era aid such as the expanded Child Tax Credit, stimulus checks and other supports has also led to a spike in poverty last year, an issue that was particularly acute with children, among whom the poverty rate doubled.
